SEKE 2012 Proceedings - Knowledge Systems Institute

Fig. 2.
Project (main challenge)
Release 1 Release 2 Release 3
Release 3 (Detailed)
Sprint 1 Sprint 2
Sprint 3
T1 T2
Mapping of Scrum build blocks into a hierarchical challenge graph
feedback is given in real-time, increasing the feeling of immersion
and also the perception that the player is the sole
responsible for the outcome. Ideally, any activity that is suitable
to using game design ideas should consider incorporating
immediate feedback, as it is mandatory to maintain the sense
of urge.
IV. MAPPING GAME MECHANICS TO SCRUM
In order to create a game-like mechanics/rules to Scrum,
the first concept one needs to map is the challenge-graph. The
fundamental goals of Scrum must be adapted as challenges to
compose the nodes. Figure 2 shows a mapping of Scrum to a
challenge graph.
The leaf-nodes in this graph are the team tasks. Each
team member must use their skills in requirements, design,
programming and testing to succeed. The evaluation of the
completion for these tasks is normally made by a PO, and
logs indicating this are registered in the Burndown Chart. The
major goal is to deliver a release, but this can be split in several
inner goals, like to acomplish the sprints.
A. Metrics to Achievements
Besides the straightforward mapping of a software development
project usign Scrum hierarchy into a challenge-graph,
many companies also define and use a fairly large set of
numeric metrics to either measure or even reward the best
developers and teams. These metrics are commonly based on
the developers performance in task planning and execution,
programming, testing or other activities.
Each of these metrics have specific meanings in the Scrum
context, but simply measuring and exposing them is not compelling
because they lack reference goals and sense of competition.
In order to convert metrics into desirable challenge,
we propose the design of individual and team achievements.
Individual achievements can be based in any individual metric,
even if it includes tasks from more than one project. Team
achievements are bounded to projects, and ideally should be
based in team-grade metrics.
Any of these metrics can be converted in achievements,
either repetition or rate based. However, it is important to
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T4
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carefully design and balance the levels (for repetition achievements)
and thresholds (rate ones), in order to make them interesting.
The first level and lowest grade medal (bronze) must
be very easy to achieve, while the others must be rendered
increasingly challenging. In Section V we show a preliminary
evaluation of both solo and collective achievements.
V. PRELIMINARY EVALUATION
We have done a preliminary evaluation of our proposal
involving real-world scrum teams. Infoway 3 is a medium-sized
software house with 28 developers, split in four teams, which
has been successfully using agile processes for six years, and
using Scrum since 2008.
Infoway has a Scrum-based project management system
that does not implement gamification in its behavior. But
the system has information about some Scrum cerimonies,
including planning, review and retrospective. There is also
information about the backlog and estimated and actual time
spent to accomplish tasks, grouped by sprints and projects. We
used these information to evaluate our proposal in a real case.
In this section we describe the achievements designed
to Scrum framework together with the evaluation of these
achievements using the Infoway historical database. The preliminary
evaluation comprises the design of ten game achievements
and the evaluation of four game achievements based on
measured metrics.
A. Achievements
As discussed before, achievements are representation of
having accomplished something. Achievements can be easy,
difficult, surprising, funny, accomplished alone or as a group.
In this section we describe the achievements directly related to
Scrum. The main idea related to the above described achievements
is to keep all staff informed about the accomplishments.
It is important to emphasize that all the achievements are
related to a project. A project is a temporary endeavor with
a defined beginning and end. During a project, several sprints
could be acomplished. This is the time box used to account
the proposed achievements in a organization.
1) Role Achievements:
• Super Scrum Master (SSM): A Super Scrum Master is
an individual repetition achievement that accounts for the
number of sprints that all the Scrum prescriptions were
followed entirely. The achievement has 3 levels: Level 1
(>=1); Level 2 (>=3); and Level 3 (>=10).
• PO Presence (POPr). PO Presence is a repetition
achievement that accounts for the number of sprints
which the PO participated of planning and review ceremonies.
The achievement has 3 levels: Level 1 (>= 1);
Level 2 (>= 3); and Level 3 (>= 10).
• PO Partner (POPa). It is a rate achievement that accounts
for the number of sprints which the PO participated
of planning and review ceremonies compared with
the total number of planning and reviews performed in
3 http://www.infoway-pi.com.br
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